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Call for Applications: 2019 Diversity and Inclusion Fellows

Call for Applications: 2019 Diversity and Inclusion Fellows

Open to all faculty, post-docs, staff, and students

Application Deadline: October 19, 2018 at 5 p.m.

What Is the Diversity and Inclusion Fellows Program?

With support from Institute Diversity and the ADVANCE Program, the Diversity and Inclusion Fellows Program brings together faculty, staff, and students who individually and collectively advance their action, research, or teaching objectives while improving inclusivity on campus. This program is a bottom-up initiative, tapping into the creativity and diversity of thought among our campus community to crowdsource ideas that create long-term culture change.

The goals of the program are to cultivate a network of ambassadors who will advance a culture of inclusive excellence and to create an environment where people feel safe, comfortable, and empowered to discuss diversity and inclusion at Georgia Tech. For more information on the Diversity and Inclusion Fellows Program, visit www.diversity.gatech.edu/DIFellowsProgram.

The bottom-up nature of this program recognizes the importance of ensuring that the Institute leverages the thoughts and actions of each individual in promoting diversity and inclusion. This complements Institute-run initiatives and programs dedicated to the same. The program is the result of a proposal submitted to the Strategic Planning Advisory Group (SPAG) in spring 2016 by a group of faculty, staff, and students led by two ADVANCE Professors in response to a call for proposals aligned with the Georgia Tech Strategic Plan.

How to Apply?

The form will ask a few questions about yourself and your role on campus. Moreover, you will be asked to answer the following questions:

Please describe an issue area or project idea you would like to focus on as a Diversity and Inclusion Fellow.

Please describe why you believe this issue/project is important to Georgia Tech.

Benefits and Outcomes

Personal and professional growth, with demonstrated commitment and skills, about diversity and inclusion knowledge and practice;

Recognition as a Fellow;

Outcomes will be commensurate with Fellows’ engagement and may include increased workplace diversity and inclusion; new collaborations, initiatives, or partnerships; and individual/joint courses or research proposals.

Commitments

The program will run from January 15 to December 1, 2019. During this time, Fellows are expected to:

Complete an individual or group action, teaching, or research objective and share with the campus community (dissemination will be facilitated by the Office of Institute Diversity);

Attend the Diversity and Inclusion Fellows Program meetings (one kick-off meeting in January 2019, two mid-stream progress meetings in spring and fall, and a final Poster Expo and Celebration event). (Note: Please mark your calendars for the 2018 event to be held at the Klaus Atrium on November 13 from 4-5:30 p.m.; the 2019 Fellow cohort will be introduced at this event).

Fellow projects may include, but are not limited to:

Developing recommendations and content for new Institutional training programs;

Creating and executing a pilot educational program and submitting a new SPAG proposal to expand that pilot;

Writing a white paper as the basis for an agency proposal, or writing the proposal itself;

Collating best practices for increasing diversity or enhancing inclusion of a given campus group;

Creating guidelines for diversity and inclusion training for new students, staff, and faculty (e.g., participating in New Faculty and Staff Orientation);

Creating a mentoring program for incoming students, faculty, or staff, informing them about issues related to diversity and inclusion, encouraging them to get involved in diversity and inclusion-related activities; and

Advising on diversity and inclusion initiatives in the classroom and staff meetings. For example, teaching faculty about preferred pronouns, visiting research labs, and leading a peer-to-peer dialogue with the students in the lab about diversity and inclusion-related issues.

Funding

We envision running three Fellows groups per year with six participants and a Lead in each group. The Lead will facilitate and coordinate the group meetings and the group project, and be responsible for ensuring there is a final deliverable that can be used/shared. Each Fellow will receive $1,000 and the Lead will receive $2,500. These funds will be disbursed upon selection as a Fellow and may be given as salary, discretionary funds for research and teaching, stipend, or fellowship (depending on the position and circumstances of each person, and as dictated by the allowable use of funds). In addition, each Fellows group can request up to $2,500/year supporting their activities, to be spent according to the rules that dictate allowable uses of state funding.

Who Should Apply for the Diversity and Inclusion Fellows Program?

All Georgia Tech faculty, post-doctoral fellows, staff, and graduate or undergraduate students are welcome to apply.

Applicants should be excited about remaining engaged with the group on a sustained basis. While the fellowship will only last formally through December 2019, our goal is to establish long-term relationships among participants, and between participants and existing campus initiatives for long-term impact.

To push our thinking in new directions, we are seeking both fellows who have been immersed in this topic as well as those interested in connecting to it from different fields and perspectives.